


Land of the Free -Home of the Damned

by FilipaMariaKecharitomene



Category: Black Panther (2018), Infinity wars - Fandom, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Road - Cormac McCarthy, X-Men (Movieverse)
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe - No Powers, Alternate Universe - Post-Apocalypse, Bride price, F/M, Forced Cohabitation, Hope, Loss of Virginity, Nick Fury is Not Amused, Sexual Slavery, Slavery, Some charater are darker, Starvation, Thanos is a genocidal manic in any universe, bride kidnapping, for now, population control, re education camps, winterprincess
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-18
Updated: 2020-08-03
Packaged: 2021-03-04 17:54:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,476
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25360462
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FilipaMariaKecharitomene/pseuds/FilipaMariaKecharitomene
Summary: When half the population of the earth is wiped out by a Global Super Weapon to curb the population, the survivors are left to scrape out a living in the dust. For Bucky Barnes and Shuri Milaje, stuck living on a compound with a few friends, each day is a test to stay alive Post-Apocalypse. When rumor of rebuilt civilization reach their ears, their excited. Until it forces them all to decide between right and wrong, servitude and freedom.
Relationships: Ben Parker & May Parker (Spider-Man) & Peter Parker, Bruce Banner/Natasha Romanov, Clint Barton/Laura Barton, James "Bucky" Barnes & Steve Rogers, James "Bucky" Barnes/Shuri, Logan/Ororo Munroe, Peggy Carter/Steve Rogers, Pepper Potts/Tony Stark, Peter Parker/Mary Jane Watson, Pietro Maximoff & Wanda Maximoff, Ramonda & Shuri (Marvel), Remy LeBeau/Rogue, Shuri & T'Challa (Marvel), Ultron & Vision, Wanda Maximoff/Vision
Comments: 11
Kudos: 26





	1. Dust

**Author's Note:**

> I've based a lot of this off real world regimes and Genocides to try and make it feel authentic. Hope you all get something from it, and a darn good story!

* * *

Chapter 1: Dust  
"Through toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. Both thorns and thistles it will yield you, and you will eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your brow you will eat your bread, until you return to the ground—because out of it were you taken. For dust you are, and to dust you shall return.” Genesis 3:18

* * *

_Before..._

* * *

_Steve's arm was companionable around his shoulders. The anchor and tie to childhood and to youth. To the swirling dusts of Afghanistan and the rough back alleys of Brooklyn. Constantly there. Constantly present. Beginning to end, birth to earth, ashes to ashes, womb to tomb. The simple motion as they walked the glowing, kaleidoscope night. Here. In the city that never slept; steadying not only his drunken feet, but his sense of place; as they made their way home from Coney Island, after a night with one of their war buddies._

_"Yeee 'memember when I made yee ride the Cyclone f'r the first time when we were kids?" he slurred, weaving._

_Steve snorted, and on his other side their pal, Sam Wilson, tightening his grip. Making sure he didn't kiss the pavement._

_"Yeah, and he threw up?" the darker skinned man chuckled, having heard this story before._

_"...This is payback, isn't it?" he murmured, as the turned the driveway towards his friend's tidy middle-class house (white picket fence and all). His wife was standing in the doorway, holding it open with her crossed-arm lean, chin tilted up._

_"I take it your mission was a successful, Captain Rogers," she quipped in her blithe British way, hand pushing rich brown curls behind her ears._

_"Affirmative, Lieutenant Rogers," Steve grinned, leaning over to kiss her cheek, before hauling him upright, like he always did. "Told you I could get him to enjoy his birthday."_

_" Don't know why you though I had too," he muttered, trying to enunciate. "Nothing special happened that day."_

_There was a very pregnant pause, and even in his state, he didn't miss the glance shared between the closest people he had to family._

_Finally Peggy cleared her elongated throat, that would be a sin to compare to an ungainly swan._

_"Will have to agree to disagree, James Barnes," she said briskly. Taking the dish towel off her shoulder, she swished it at the three of them. "Now upstairs, all of you. You'll all have headaches to feel in the morning that I certainly won't envy."_

_Wry chuckles, another kiss goodnight for Steve, a fumble upstairs, and the three guys were ready to part ways for the night._

" _Hey," he said, awkwardly outside his guest room -which had become his room since he and Steve got back from the war, and he had no damn where to go. "I didn't mean-"_

_"I know Buck," Steve said gently, a smile, forgiving smile on his face. One that he always had and made him feel like a worse ungrateful shit._

_"I appreciate everything you've done for me-"_

_"We know," coming closer, Steve rested a hand on his shoulder. "And we love having you here. So you can stay long as you need."_

_…if twenty-four years on this earth had shown him anything, proven anything, it was this. Nobody deserved as good a friend as Steve Rogers._  
_This time, his smile felt more real._

_"Thanks."_

_Steve grinned back. "Good. Now don't do anything stupid till morning."_

_"How can I," he drawled. "All the stupid's going with you -see you in the morning."  
_

_"See you in the morning."_

_Morning..._

_Morning never came._

_Cause late that night-_

_What was later known as the Snap happened._

* * *

_After..._

* * *

Nights were darker now, since the end of the world. Dark beyond darkness and the days more gray each one than what had gone before.

Bucky had never considered himself a poet...that was Steve's gift, long with art, leadership, and all-round decency. But the torment and desolation of what had once been his home seemed to have awaken that untapped portion in his psyche, ready to form eulogy to what remained of the Concert Jungle. 

He snorted, gripping his military grade knife tighter, as he and Steve crawled over the broken bones of buildings that a year ago had been Manhattan -shattered scrappers that had once touched the sky. Lights and machines that used to glow and sparkle and serve, now silent hunks of scrap under frozen falling snow.

Every now and then, they'd see the rare form of another survivor, covered head to toe in mismatched winter wear though it was nearly April, nervous and wild eye, gathered around small fire before Hoover-houses of tin and brick or squatting in the shadows of building; clenching what food they had in their grasps like cavemen of old. 

Sure looked like the stone age. When whatever had happened, happened, it not only wiped out every other living creature, not only short-circuited every last electronic thing, but it had made the weather over the city perpetually gray, bleak with swirling dust and snow and lack of hope. 

In front of him, Steve stilled, holding up a hand with every bit of military discipline. Lowering to a crouch, his blue eyes shown under dirty blond hair. 

"Buck...look."

He followed his gaze, and felt his breath leave him.

"Holy hell."

A yearling stag paced was digging in the snow just before them. Scrawny thing...but it had more meat on it than Bucky had seen in six months. With the one pistol they had, Steve took aim, firing twice. The deer was hit, and immediately started running, but stumbled and fell. Bucky sprang up charging forward and ignoring how dizzy it made him. Refusing to think how much calories he was burning. His knife drew a jagged line cross the deer's neck, red warmth spewing in a river. 

But it was dead. Which meant for one more week...they weren't.

"Lets get it home," Steve said, picking it up over his shoulder.

Bucky made a face -he couldn't help it. Yeah.

_Home._

* * *

_Now..._

* * *

The thing before them wasn't home. Home was doors, and warmth, and real roofs, and _safety,_ and knowing if your best friend left his best girl there to go find some food, no sonvabitch would find what used to be a park pavilion, see the pretty doll gathering firewood outside it, and understand she didn't have a free-for-taking sign flashing in neon over her head.

But that's what happened, and Bucky thank whatever God there was that Steve, he and Sam had only been a little ways in the woods, setting up traps for small animals when the screaming started. He'd never seen Steve look so damn terrfied in all his life. Or -when they got back to the clearing -raced back- and saw the intruder hauling Peggy over his shoulder...so God-damn murderous.

It had been three -four, counting Peggy- against one, so the bastard had been dead in a matter of minutes. They burried him unceremoniously, but damn if his touch didn't linger on all of them, not just in the bruises the prick left on Peggy's arms and thighs. Now only two of them would go out to forage or hunt, one always remaining behind with her.

Now, Steve's shoulders didn't relax till they saw the shanty log house the four of them had made, with skills learned in both the army and boy scouts. 

Now, the Capt. didn't breath easy till his best girl came out the blanket they'd hung on the door, pass the pens holding a few formally domesticated chickens and turkeys and goats they managed to find in desolate farms. She was still a beauty, despite lost weight, tangled hair, and trembling chin, clothed in the same mismatch bits of anything they could get. The result being that all of them looked a bit like gyspys or carnival folk. 

Sam came out too, and both their eyes light up at the sight of the deer. 

"Oh, now we're talkin'," Sam proclaimed, slapping his hands together, eyes raised up to the heavens like a reverend.

"We can have a real feast," Peggy proclaimed, delighted, gripping Steve's arm. "You boys get to chopping this thing up -I'll get the fire up and roaring. Spit spot now."

"Yes ma'am," they all chorused, chuckling. All a bit giddy at the thought of full bellies.

Later that night, when they'd had all they could eat -and after they hung up and smoked the remainder to preserve it, they huddled near the fire under the blankets that also served as their bedding. To full and lazed to do much other than talk. Silently reflect. Plan. . 

"We can't survive another winter this far north," Sam spoke the obvious, black eyes looking around at all of them. "If we try...we're gonna die."

Steve pressed his lips and Peggy pressed closer while Bucky dropped his dark head, lank strand of hairs escaping the band he tied it with.

"...He right," Peggy backed him softly, eyes soft in the smoky room. "But where do we go?"

"Anywhere but here," Bucky tossed in, stabbing his knife into the ground. "South, southwest...doesn't matter. We gotta get out. Find some place else. Try and start again."

"...Barton had a farm down near Delaware, don't he," Sam had carefully, remembering their buddy from their special forces unit. "If he's alive..."

He trailed of, leaving it unsaid. Cause it didn't have to be said.

They all turned to Steve, knowing well that he was the head of their mismatch little family.

Eventually, he smiled bleakly. "Well, can't argue with all three of you. In any case, you're right. There's nothing for us here."

Bucky wonder if he was they only one who truly ready the flash of pain in Steve's eyes as he said this -cause he felt it himself. Brooklyn New York had been their crib and cradle and stomping grounds -their _home._

And now, thanks to whatever happened...it was unlivable. Steve pushed it down. 

"When the weather warms up...we pack up, and get the hell outta here."

* * *

_Soon..._

* * *

His breath rose and fell softly that night, studying the edge of the knife they were all straddling. and not for the first time, wondered what the hell was it to land them all in this shit -it didn't make sense. First there had been a roar, fierce and loud like seven thunders. Then there had been light, so fast, their had been nowhere to hide. Somehow, everyone in the Rogers household had been spared...but most of the street was gone. Flesh, blood, not even bones remained. And buildings were crumpled on the ground

The rioting of panicked, senseless people started after that -weeks of fires and gunshots and killing each other of a crust of bread -Bucky still wasn't sure how they'd survived that, cause it only stopped when bone chilling cold came early...and still hadn't left. 

He stiffed, and looked at his sleeping friends, somewhere in the dark. 

But it would leave. And so would they.


	2. Road

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bucky, Steve, Peggy, and Sam risk it all to travel southward, not sure what they'll find. The way is dangerous, but new friends might help lift their spirits.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks everyone who's read and reviewed this story! I hope you enjoy where I take us on this adventure!

* * *

Chapter 2: Road

“The Lord said to Moses, ‘Depart, go up... to the land which I swore to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob... I will send an angel before you and I will drive out the Canaanites... go up to a land of milk and honey.’” Exodus 33:1-3

* * *

There had been days when Bucky thought they'd never live to see the unfurling of green again, that either they'd be long gone and dead, or the earth to battered to renew itself in a fresh unrolled buds of trees and leaves. But the earth had proven it was a soldier, just like them. And took out a faded olive green uniform to report for duty, after driving the snow and cold into a soft retreat. Though maybe fall back was the better term...cause the gray whether and frozen nothingness still linger 'round the edges, hissing, pressing to re-advanced. 

Spring and summer wouldn't be able to hold the line for long. They had to get out of there.

It took time to build the wagon cart -Buck and Sam hacking down bendable branches of trees, while Steve used some old carpenter tricks his dad had taught him to weave, twist, hammer with their collection of salvaged nails and a rock into a workable shape with workable -though far from ideal- wheels.

They also made cages for the turkeys and chickens, and braided cloth rope to leash the milk goats. Peggy, meanwhile, was going mad packing up what canned food they'd managed to collect over the winter, as well as folding their clothes and blankets into neat little bundles to fit in the little kids’ rambler sized-wagon.

Sooner than Bucky would've thought possible...sooner than he'd ever hoped the day would come...the day of leaving was here, and he, Sam and the Rogers were standing there outside of the clearing; looking at their little makeshift hovel-from-hell...inside which the bare, _bare_ floor had more often been been reduced to mud...whose walls failed miserably to keep out the wind and sleet...whose roof had dripped water on them at night...with lumps in their throats. That miserable little shack had saved their lives - no getting around that. And that strange horrible sensation of abandoning home crawled over them all.

"Oh Steve," Peggy whispered, eyes blurry. Her husband tightened his arms around her for a moment, given her -them- the second they needed to bid this scrap heap adieu. 

"Hell," Bucky muttered, before stepping forward with Steve and Sam with his knife in hand. After a moment's debate:

"Don't make it long-"

"Don't give hints where we're going."

"Short and sweet."

-he carved a careful message into it's wood:

* * *

_Left for better grounds. Want it, ya welcomed to it -it saved us._

_J.B. S.R. &P.R. S.W_

* * *

And then they were gone. Without another look back; wagon wheels turning chunky underneath them after they found one long stretched of road. A highway rather, flat and smooth. So once Steve had used his father's old compass to point the way south, it should've been as simple; Steve, Bucky, and Sam taking shifts in pulling the damn thing. Peggy was exempt, since she was leading the goats, with a pack of clothes on her back -it would've been too heavy for her anyways. 

"Jesus, Steve, did'ya make wheels or squares?" Sam complained on his shift one day -not for the first time.

"Hey lay off him," Bucky drawled, using a free hand to re-tie his dark hair back again, the blue of his eye peering calmly at them while Peggy sniggered besides him, trying to delicately turn it into coughs. 

Steve looked at him gratefully, but Bucky wasn't done.

"-he made hexagons, not squares."

"...Very funny," Steve grumbled, as his wife and Sam exploded into pearls of laughter -though they instantly hushed themselves, their whole gang stilling for a moment like deer in the headlight. Listening. Six long months of apocalyptic winter had taught them death would been hiding under the snap of a blade of grass, the rustling of bushes. Other survivors outside their group were potential hostiles of varying degree. The few -very few- friendly's they've met were telling gibbering tals of gangs called 'Roadgents'. As the named implied, they hung out around roads like they ones they had no choice but to travel by. Waiting for traveling parties to get in their cross-hairs before -BAM.

Unleashing hell on the poor sons-of-bitches.

They were thieves.

Thugs.

Murderers.

Rapists. 

Horror tales were being whispered up and down the American roads...like the kind you would hear about in the middle fucking east...

But this was home. This was here, and it killed them. This...this was happening in the place he'd swore an oath to serve and protect -land of the free...home of the damned.

It killed Steve more than the rest of them -Bucky loved his country sure -so did Sam and Peggy (though for Peggy it had been her second home). But Steve...Steve had always seemed to _embodied_ the country. The best of it. Not because he was blond or white or tall or even 'cause he was as sharp as he was -though these _were_ all part of _him_ ; part of the Irish-American strains of blood that bred him.

No...Steve had embodied, believed in, sworn by, and trusted the sheer all-American trait of hope. Hope for himself, hope for other people. Hope in the belief that goodness was a thing to strive for, and that if you wanted it, your future could be better tomorrow. 

And Steve was stubborn...Bucky could tell from the tick of his jaw, the sharpness of his eyes that he still believed that. Even now...even now.

How the hell his friend did it, Bucky didn't pretend to know or understand.

But that didn't stop them all from clinging to get, with the furor of drowning men.

Steve scanned the surrounding trees for a bit more, the raw metal poles and green road signs riddled with bullets, and resting his hand on the pistol they still had, with a pouch full of ammo slung over his shoulder. 

That he took off now and handed to Bucky.

"Give it here Sam," he said, motioning for the cart. "It's my turn."

* * *

How long they went like this, Bucky gave up counting. Days bleed into weeks, and weeks into seasons. The only good side to that was the further south they went, the warmer it was. The greener it was, a weak bloom of summer coming up to them. And with summer, was a farm's abandon corn fields half-wild, berry patches and orchards they pillaged without remorse.

It was here they met the Parkers. It was Peggy who found them first, while riffling through a strawberry bundle that another hand -pale and wan with hunger just like hers, reached for the same prize as she did. And released a similar shriek up to the heavens as both fumbled back, gasping at the first female face either had seen since the Snap. 

Then their were the voices of their boys, panicked, in attack mood, charging from where they were to find them. Peggy and the other woman locked gazes, held it, then leapt up to intercept their men with their softness, gentle walls grinding everything to a harsh halt. 

"It's alright, Steve, it's alright," Peggy was talking briskly, though her big brown eyes addressed all three of her companions. "I just had a bit of a start is all."

"What the hell happened?" Steve demanded, breathing hard as his adrenaline struggled to eased.

Peggy smiled a little impishly. Then looked over her shoulder, at the other woman, who was just finishing up talking to her quarter-staff bearing man and a teenage boy by his side...though he looked a little too young to be their son -about fifteen. Though he was little too _old_ to be a grandson.

"I believe I've made a friend."

Apparently, the other woman -purple scarf wrapped around her graying hair- was able to convinced her family of the same, cause the well weathered man, in an old plaid shirt -the kind Steve still favored as well- careful came closer. Steve did the same, and was the first to offer a hand.

"Steve Rogers."

"...Ben Parker."

They shook.

Steve looked over at the other woman and the child...the first child any of them had seen in a hell of a long time. He was a good looking kid...reddish-brown hair, brown totally-alert eyes held wide open, like they had another sort of sense that wanted to take in anything. Anything that might reek of opportunity or danger.

"Been a while since we've had dinner guests, but your welcomed to join us tonight. If you like."

They tried to hid it, Bucky gave them credit for that. But hunger had long stacked it's claim on their faces. It left the shadow of death in their eyes. Honestly, it was a wonder they made it this far.

"We'd like that." Ben Parker said.

* * *

For the occasion, they eat the five eggs the chickens in the cart had laid this morning, milk from the goats, and berries from the field. It was feast like few of them could remember, and from the way the Parkers looked at their bowls, what they'd likely thought they'd never see again, raw and mashed together in a sort of soup that it was. 

"Thank you," Peter Parker offered quietly, but they could tell from his eyes that that kid meant it -that living in this world hadn't broken the gratitude. and something about that made the rest of them ease up, loosen. They were all seated within the remains of an old barn, spread on the hay on-top of the blankets they commandeered from braking into the farmer's house. 

"Your welcomed son," Steve answered, and Peggy turned to May Parker.

"Where you say you were from again?"

"Queens New York."

It was a good thing it was dark, cause both Bucky and Steve made faces. Hey, it might be the apocalypse, but Brooklyn was still the best neighborhood on Manhattan island. Dodgers over Mets. (Never mind that the former left for Los Angles).

"And where ya'll headed," Sam asked, making a general motion of distant with his hand.

The Parkers were silent for a moment, looking to one another before Ben heaved a breath.

"Anywhere but there."

"Ah."

They were all quiet again. Then Peggy reached out and touched Steve's arm, her skin pale and luminous in the light of the raising moon. Steve met her eyes, and Bucky could see a thousand words spoken between them.

Steve cleared his throat.

"Well, how bout you head anywhere long side with us?" he spoke. Sam choked on his canteen water, but Bucky just ducked his head and hissed laughter through his teeth. Yeah, classic Steve.

The Parkers started, and stared. And Bucky watched as Peter's eyes filled the same kind of sheer hope Steve always carried. But his Aunt and Uncle hesitated. Leary. 

Bucky couldn't blame them.

"Why would you do that?" May asked softly, hold firm to Ben's hand. Steve breathed out.

"...Because I have to believe that one day, the world will crawl out of this mess, and build something new instead. It won't be today, tommrow, or next year...but I got to believe that someone will be there to see it. We stand a better chance if we stick together."

Steve blushed then, and shrugged a shoulder. "Also...it just the right thing to do."

The Parkers still stared, mouths slightly opened.

"...Do you write this stuff down, or just make it up as you go?" Sam muttered. Peggy shushed him.

After a long moment, Ben reached his hand forward again.

"I suppose will take you up on that offer of yours Capt. Not like we go a better one."

* * *

So it came to pass that their little band went from four to seven, and honestly...Bucky wasn't sure how he felt about it. On one hand, the part of him that was still decent was pleased to help these people, glad to see the hope slowly coming back in their eyes. On the other hand...larger parties made for bigger targets, and how the Parkers managed not to get raided by the Roadgents God only knew.

Ben and May were a bit to old to be of any used in a fight, and Peter a little too young...though the kid had better, _keener_ , senses than anyone in the party it seemed like. He moved with the ease of a spider crawling up its web, nimble and darting. And it didn't take much figuring to see that more likely than not, Peter's sixth sense and gift with knowing when and how to move had saved his life, and his family's since the snap. 

Bucky sighed.

Well given that they were part of the group, and unlikely to part, it made sense to get to know them some. So he listened as Sam teased the kid over a picture he'd pulled out of his pocket.

Of him and two other kids, grinning with arms around each other shoulders.

"Well, you look mighty happy to be arm and arm with Pretty Miss Redhead," Sam chuckled, though his tone was soft. "Who was she?"

Peter redden slightly, and shrugged a shoulder under a too-large jacket.

"She uh...went to my school. But we've been friends since we were kids. Her name's Mary Jane Waston...we all called her M.J. The other's guy's Harry Osborne."

That raised Bucky's brow. Steve's too. Osborne hadn't been an unknown name in the army...second to Tony Stark, he was their main weapons provider. With rumors of other, not so legal deals going off on the side.

"...What happened to them?" Peggy inquired. And Peter got real quiet. Too quiet. The kind of quiet that turned his young face more than hundred years old in pure sorrow.

"...I don't know," he admitted, and it was clear this answer killed him. "After the snap, I tried to find them, I did but...I don't know."

They didn't ask anything more about Mary Jane or Harry Osborne after that. Ghosts were never a healthy subject. They keep on walking 'lone the lonely road, doing their damn hardest to out pace 'em.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I decided to keep May and Ben's age ambivalent to honor the comics. Plus living in the end times would cause premature aging for sure.  
> I'm still ticked at MCU for robbing Peter of his canon friends and meaningful people in his life (Mary Jane is so important to his story! Harry too! There's nothing wrong with their characters! I was introduced to Marvel by the Sam Rami films so here they are.)


	3. Strange Land

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Finally arrived at the Bartons' its not a universal welcomed. But somone's taken an interest in Bucky...

* * *

"I have been a stranger in a strange land." Exodus 2:22

* * *

Summer rolled on. So did the road. Their little band trudging along in the ever increasing warmth when they finally passed the partly blown up sign welcoming them to Delaware. They walked faster then, hope picking up their steps, lighting their eyes. 

But their food supplies was slowing to a trickle, and their bodies were starting to fail them; already loose clothing now dangling on their frames -Ben and May were so thin, you could almost wrap your hands 'round their waists. Everyday they walked, they did so without complaint, but their strength was steadily being poured out to dust, fortitude beginning to fail them. It was getting to the point where Peter had secretly begun to give sections of his own food in addition to theirs, when they weren't looking, eyes lit with the same worry that made the kid gnaw his lower lip to shreds. 

It was a worry Steve and Bucky knew too well -that primal fear of being a orphan twice over. Of being left alone. So despite the Parkers' protests, they, Sam, and Peggy (who went a long way in gently smoothing ruffled feathers) began carrying objects of the elderly pair to ease their burdens. And quickly brushed it aside when -later that day- Peter came up to quietly thank them. 

"Its just common decency, son," Steve assured him, a comforting hand on his bony shoulder, making the kid set his jaw and somehow find the will to put strength in his gaze. "You just do what you can now -we're almost there."

Almost there...Almost there...

The words had become a liturgy to them, a chalice of mystical proportions, flowing with promise Bucky wasn't entirely sure they had the right to make these people or even themselves. What insurance did they have that _there_ would be any better than _here?_ There was no way to be certain that Barton had survived...whatever it was that changed the world.

Or even if he had, that he'd still be living in the same place-

Just as he thought this, there was a _whish_ sound that came from the trees, and a thin metal canister stuck itself in the midst of them. There wasn't time to blink -or in Sam's case to curse- before the thing beep and a cloud of smoke engulfed them; choking their startled cries and bring Peggy and the Parkers -who were the closest in proximity to it- to their knees, as the Steve tried to get the ex-military into some resembling a position of defense.

"Where man?" Sam cough, sputtered. "I can't see a damn-"

There was a flash of blue and gray, and Sam disappeared into the smoke with a startled grunt. Bucky cursed, and tried to to go after him, but the cool press of metal against his temple strong disagreed with that decision.

* * *

"On your knees," a woman's voice coldly intoned; strangely silky, yet allowing no argument -the voice of a woman more than capable of pulling the trigger. "Hands behind your back. Now."

-Fucking Christ, Bucky cursed to himself silently as he did as he was ordered, quickly being restrained by zip-ties. The smoke was gradually clearing by this point, showing Peggy and the Parkers still on their knees, gasping for breath. Sam had been tackled -and handcuffed- by a eighteen year old with silver-blond hair in a ragged blue under-armor, who bounced on his heels a little to pleased, looking to the woman for approval as he leveled a semi-automatic at them. And when Bucky got a glimpse of her, he could see why. She was beauty -a marble statue come to life, with bouncy, pseudo forties-kinda shoulder length curls, in the deepest blood red against the makeshift remains of her policewoman's armor, the name of Romanov printed across the back. 

But her beauty was chilled by her eyes -twin slabs of green, telling nothing of what she intended to do with them. 

"Barton told your chief he wasn't interested in working with you," the woman announced smoothly, almost smugly, knowing she had Steve in a position of total control. "He not gonna chance his mind just because you keep coming back. He told me to tell you the next time -"

"Wait," Steve blurted out, holding his hands out in calming gesture. "Barton as in Clint Barton? Hawkeye? You know him?"

The woman paused, and narrowed her gaze, rethinking something about the whole of what was happening. He friend wasn't so subtle.

"Of course we know him!" he exclaimed, his voice holding the hint of an eastern European accent as he swagged over. "You thought that he was friendless so you could pick on the old man and his family? Sorry -no. That's no how this works." 

"The hell are you talking about man?!" Sam exclaimed, straining in his cuffs. "We're not after Barton! We know him!"

"How?" the woman demanded quickly, eyes processing info like a computer. 

"We served together in Afghanistan, Ma'am," Steve interceded immediately. "He was our sniper. I was Captain Steve Rogers, and these are James Barnes-"

Bucky inclined his head.

"Sam Wilson-"

"What'sup," Sam grumbled from his spot on the ground.

"My wife and some friends," Steve finished up. "We survived the winter up north, and came down here looking to see if Hawkeye was still alive...you got to believe us Ma'am, we mean him no harm."

The woman was coldly silent. Reflecting. 

Then she stepped aside and motioned them all to their feet.

"Walk in front of us," she invited calmly, and her friend nearly gave himself whiplash in how fast he turned his head to her.

"But Officer Nat-" he protested, only to be quieted with a look of chilling control.

"Easy Pietro," she droned.

Then she continued.

"Walk in front of us- but the cuff stay on until we have Barton's word your who you say you are. And if he says you're telling me lies-" she shrugged amiable. "Well we're gonna have to do something about that, wont we?"

* * *

It wasn't a long stroll from the road when the Delaware woods suddenly gave way to farmland again, standing with newly growing corn that made Bucky's mouth water with the promise of steady food. After following a dirt path for some ways till they reached...reached...

A house.

Just a house. And in a sane world, the one before the Snap, that wouldn't have been anything special. Anything remarkable. But it wasn't a sane world. A normal world. Now the sight of a fully functioning house, with a picket fence still standing, its grassy yard scattered with children's toys as their young owners ran around, the porch bustling and blooming as four pretty women joked and laughed over a washtub of laundry...it was something out of a dream. Or the dream of a dream. 

One that their mere presence turned back into reality as Romanov brought them forward. The kids -a girl and boy, stopped dead in their play, looking up like frightened fawns as they ran for their heavily pregnant mother. Who had turned her head and begun calling for her husband as Nat and Pietro lined up their prisoners, before the steps of the porch just as three more faces armed with a bow, pistol, and machete, respectively. All men. Two faces were black -though one was reasonably young and the other middle age. One's gaze was nearly as cold as Romanov, while the older man had a patch over one eye, and a glower that made it look like something had pissed him off the day he was born. 

The third was entirely familiar though, though his scruff blond hair had gotten grayer with stress. But his smart alec mouth was tugging like his lowered bow string as he gazed at each of them.

"I'll be goddamn," Clint Barton nearly laughed.

"Hawkeye," Steve greeted, grinning himself.

"Good to see you still alive man," Sam agreed.

Hopping down the porch stairs, Clint turned to the ex-police officer.

"Turn 'em loose Nat. These are my friends."

* * *

"A _machete_ brother?" dryly sniggered the youngest of the women who'd been doing laundry on the porch -at eighteen years old, she was still more of a girl, her flowering speech patterns and roll of her r's betraying her origins from the African continent, more so than her ruby-brown skin or dark, dove-like eyes.

* * *

[Just like the white winged dove  
Sings a song  
Sounds like she's singin' ...](https://genius.com/Stevie-nicks-edge-of-seventeen-lyrics#note-858877)

* * *

She tossed a dozen some small braids over her shoulder, as the lyrics played softly on the Bartons C.D. (which his genius little sister had managed to get into working order) their little group had taken on the porch with them, to both enjoy and shield there speech from the 'seniors,' of the group.

"There's a potential threat, Clint and Commissioner Fury grab a bow and a gun...and you grab a _machete?_ Why to alleviate the stereotypes about Africans, brother."

T'Challa Milaje, martial arts master, and only son of the renowned tech mogul T'Chaka, whose face one grace times magazine as a Bringer of Tomorrow, scowled at his little gadfly of a sister, wondering how even the _Apocalypse_ couldn't compel her to bind her tongue before strangers. It didn't matter that Clint had vouched for them -they did not yet have _his_ approval. And since the Bartons has generously allowed him, his sister, and their aged mother to take sanctuary in their home after the Snap, he was under obligation to defend it. From anything.

"It was the closest thing at hand," he defended fervently, before holding a finger to his lips, straining to hear the sounds coming from the kitchen, as the strangers wove their tale. "Now hush you, we much hear this-"

Shuri rolled her eyes again, a note of caution appearing. 

"Just don't let paranoia block your ears either T'Challa," she warned.

* * *

[And the days go by  
Like a strand in the wind](https://genius.com/Stevie-nicks-edge-of-seventeen-lyrics#note-4931732)   
[In the web that is my own  
I begin again](https://genius.com/Stevie-nicks-edge-of-seventeen-lyrics#note-15551906)

* * *

"Its not paranoia if there's reason to be suspicious," he countered, and stranding besides them on the porch, pacing before them on the step, Pietro Maximoff nodded ferociously.

"Nothing in the world's as it seems now," the first of the Bartons' foster kids insisted. Shaking his head, clearly seeing something besides the nighttime sky behind their eyes, to the point where his twin, Wanda, bite her lip, rose up from the porch swing in her red nightgown and tried to take her brothers arm. But he refused her comfort, tugging free of the dark hair girl and avoiding her exasperated, green-eyed gazed. 

"One mistake...that's all it takes now. One mistake and BAM..." He clapped his hands to prove his point. "You're done. And there's no do overs."

"Yes, Pietro," Wanda clipped out. "I'm sure the boy's, whose younger than us- and his elderly aunt and uncle, are planning to murder us in our sleep. If they can move without combustion after eating thirds of Ramonda and Laura's cooking first. We must be on our guard."

Pietro turned red, but didn't back down.

"But those three guys are -were- military...it's just dumb luck that me and Natasha caught them by surprise and got the drop on them. If we hadn't...they're fighters, _soră mai mică_. I can see it in their eyes."

"Maybe it only death their fighting against," Wanda said simply. "Remember how after the Snap...me, Shuri, and T'Challa had to fight our way home from UD? Remember how we looked -how we acted- when we finally made it back. You nearly didn't recognize us...not even me, _frate_. The fight to stay alive wrapped us... _a trebuit din nou să devenim oameni."_

"So maybe these people have to as well," Shuri mused, following her collage roommate's theory. And it was a good one, cause even in Captain Rogers' impeccable manners, there was an air of exhaustion, of having to carry a burden to much for his shoulders. And that burden was called hope. Which was something that had been slow to kindle in the eyes of his fellows.

Especially the one with long dark hair tied back, and haunted blue eyes.

* * *

He was no more  
(He was no more)  
Than a baby then  
Well, he seemed broken-hearted...

* * *

He was a handsome fellow, but their had been a sadness to it...like he had decided something about himself, and whatever it was...it wasn't good. Like something was...she didn't like to use the word, but the one that came to mind was...broken. Not into weakness per-say...but into despair. Very understandably of course, given the world they currently inhabited but...they were alive. The others seemed aware of that fact at least. But Barnes...Shuri though that was his name... seem to disregard that fact in respect to himself as non-important. 

That simply wouldn't do, Shuri decided, nodding in sanctification to herself. To be alive was a gift, and if he was gonna stay here, then she'd do what she could to help him realize it.

* * *

[Just like the white winged dove  
Sings a song  
Sounds like she's singin'  
Whoo, baby, whoo](https://genius.com/Stevie-nicks-edge-of-seventeen-lyrics#note-858877)

* * *

_Romanian translation:_

_Frate_ -brother

 _soră mai mică_ \- little sister

 _a trebuit din nou să devenim oameni \- _we had to become human again

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Already, now thinks are kicking up, hope you enjoy -anything you'd like to see happen? Please feel free to leave suggestions. I hope you like my re-imaginating of Nat for this, I was going for realistic badass.

**Author's Note:**

> Hey! this is my first story here! I hope you enjoy and feel free to leave comments!


End file.
